Social media reacts to Greg Sankey's NCAA Tournament qualifier comments after SEC starts 1-5
As the upset losses began to pile up for SEC teams in the 2024 NCAA Tournament, Greg Sankey's comments regarding automatic qualifiers aged more and more poorly.
Ahead of the NCAA Tournament, Sankey told ESPN's Pete Thamel in an interview that he felt automatic qualifiers were hurting the competitiveness of the tournament, particularly among fringe teams from so-called power conferences such as the SEC. He pointed out runs by First Four teams UCLA and Syracuse — to the Final Four and Sweet 16, respectively — to back up his claim.
REQUIRED READING: Rick Barnes would rather not be playing Texas for Sweet 16 spot. Here's why.
The SEC commissioner, of course, also co-chaired the NCAA transformation committee that formally recommended in January 2023 that the tournament expand from 68 teams, a number which has remained steady since its last expansion in 2011. It has expanded only minimally from its 1985 expansion to 64 teams, going to 65 in 2001 and 68 in 2011.
"That just tells you that the bandwidth inside the top 50 is highly competitive," Sankey said. "We are giving away highly competitive opportunities for automatic qualifiers [from smaller leagues], and I think that pressure is going to rise as we have more competitive basketball leagues at the top end because of expansion."
Since his comments, however, the SEC has experienced major losses in the NCAA Tournament, posting a 1-5 record in the conference's first six games. Only 2 seed Tennessee won among that group, downing 15 seed Saint Peter's 83-49 in the first round on Thursday. Each of the other five SEC teams lost to lower seeds, with 8 seed Mississippi State losing to 9 seed Michigan State; 7 seed Florida falling to 10 seed Colorado; and 6 seed South Carolina losing to 11 seed Oregon.
Then you have two of the top SEC teams losing to a pair of automatic qualifiers from smaller conferences. Kentucky, a 3 seed, was upset in grand fashion by 14 seed Oakland. Then, SEC Tournament champion and 4 seed Auburn dropped its first-round contest to 13 seed Yale.
Following the SEC's poor start, numerous college basketball fans reveled in Sankey's poorly aged comments, including CBS sports writer Tom Fornelli:
The SEC is now 1-5 in the tournament (Alabama and A&M still to play) with losses to Oakland and Yale. No wonder Greg Sankey wants to get all these small schools out of the dance.
— Tom Fornelli (@TomFornelli) March 22, 2024
Here is a collection of some of the more notable reactions to Sankey's comments:
REQUIRED READING: March Madness schedule today: TV channels, scores for Friday's NCAA Tournament first round games
Social media reactions to Greg Sankey after SEC 1-5 start
Friendly reminder that SEC commissioner Greg Sankey is a stain on college sports and his precious “competitive basketball league” is proving to be quite fraudulent pic.twitter.com/XDSCDr0mPx
— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) March 22, 2024
… did Greg Sankey jinx the SEC????
— Nicole Auerbach (@NicoleAuerbach) March 22, 2024
Greg Sankey seeing the SEC teams in the first round pic.twitter.com/Cm5qEOz04L
— dogwood maple (@dogwood_maple) March 22, 2024
Greg Sankey really just said the NCAA Tournament should get rid of auto bids right before 2 of the SEC's 3 best teams lost to Oakland & Yale: pic.twitter.com/WCssgVqD5I
— College Sports Only (@CollegeSportsO) March 22, 2024
The basketball gods straight up taunting Greg Sankey right now.
— Kevin Scarbinsky (@KevinScarbinsky) March 22, 2024
Greg Sankey deserved every bit of those last few minutes.
Don’t lay a finger on our tournament.— Trilly Donovan (@trillydonovan) March 22, 2024
Maybe Greg Sankey can get the NCAA to change the tournament rules so the SEC can replace teams that lose in the first round with more, worse, SEC teams
— Eamonn Brennan (@eamonnbrennan) March 22, 2024
Since Greg Sankey said "We are giving away highly competitive opportunities for automatic qualifiers," the SEC has lost to AQs Oakland and Yale.
— Chris Vannini (@ChrisVannini) March 22, 2024
SEC is 1-5 in NCAA Tourney despite being higher seeded team in all 6 games
SEC teams have lost to:
No. 9 Michigan State
No. 10 Colorado
No. 11 Oregon
No. 13 Yale
No. 14 Oakland
Only win vs. No. 15 St. Peter’s— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) March 22, 2024
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Social media reacts to Greg Sankey, SEC 1-5 NCAA Tournament record